A Trunk Full of Memories

This is the tale of a trunk, a very old and beautiful trunk, with which many miles were traveled and memories made. It belonged to my dad's parents, Grand-dad Mont (yes, Monty is named after him ... actually Montgomery) and Ornina (her real name was Florine, but we always called her Ornina). They were missionaries to Africa and are ultimately the reason (my dad would never have attended Krugersdorp High School and met my mom!) why I had the amazing opportunity to live a life offering the best of two worlds, beginning in South Africa and continuing here in the US. They traveled between South Africa, Kenya, Zambia, Zimbabwe and America (though I may have left others out) for a very long time and my father has many captivating stories to tell, of ships he sailed from one continent to the next, countries he visited (though when we were children the stories that had our hearts beating wildly were those of the US - Disney World!, snow!, fast food! ), and experiences he had. My grand parents lived lives immersed in other cultures, a part of them, and they were completely devoted to loving people and introducing them to God. In the years that followed after they passed away, I was given a few items that belonged to them. One of the sweetest of those is this trunk, something that so wonderfully epitomizes the life they lived; weathered and worn from use, but just perfect. You can still just barely make out my grandfather's name and the city they called home  - 

L. M. Duncan   

Greenville, SC   USA

It's interesting to imagine people traveling with these, isn't it? So presumably cumbersome. 

Since I've lived in the US, I've kept my most precious papers and photos in this box. As I rummaged through the trinkets, I came across a scrap book I made in the early 90's, at about 13 or 14 years. The pages are filled with magazine cut outs of my favorite fashion looks of that day and it's pretty wild to see what I considered "cool" then, hasn't exactly changed much. 

First page - the SA flag at that time, soon to be replaced with the new one (top right). 

( Aside - I feel like I have to say "we" instead of "I" because these pages represent both Raschika and I and everything we loved together. In case you missed this, Chika and I grew up together, meeting each other on our first day in kindergarden and hardly apart after that. Though she is still in SA, we remain best friends.) 

So ... "we" thought Benetton ads were just the coolest ever! I have several of them in this book. Funny.  

Seems that I've loved animal prints for a really long time. 

The days of grunge and Dr. Martens ... still would love a pair of those, now covered in flowers!

This look reminds me of Free People.

Couldn't get enough Swatch watches. I had 2 or 3!

The one concert I went to when I lived there, Dr. Alban. Hahaha. Very interesting... 

I went to a Valentine's dance at Raschika's school (my school did not have dances). Her mom had a dress made for her out of this fabric. It was fab-u-lous!

We even made it into the paper! Chika on the left and me in the middle. Dance was our entire life.

 Well, that's it. Thanks for taking a little walk with me down memory lane. Had a lovely day today celebrating little E's real birthday! He's amazing ... truly. Have a fab weekend!